LETTER TO 



of a farm, and in the erection of buildings, as four or five English 

 of the same age and size. Yet, have many of the New England 

 farmers returned. Even they have had cause to repent of their 

 folly. What hope is there, then, that English farmers will 

 succeed ? 



1018. It so happens, that / have seen new settlements formed. 

 I have seen lands cleared. I have seen crowds of people coming 

 and squatting down in woods or little islands, and by the sides of 

 rivers. I have seen the log-hut raised ; the bark covering put 

 on ; I have heard the bold language of the adventurers ; and I 

 have witnessed their subsequent miseries. They were just as 

 free as you are ; for, they, like you, saw no signs of the existence 

 of any government, good or bad. 



1019. New settlements, particularly at so great a distance from 

 all the conveniences and sweeteners of life, must be begun by 

 people who labour for themselves. Money is, in such a case, almost 

 useless. It is impossible to believe, that, after your statement 

 about your intended hundred acres of Indian corn, you would not 

 have had it, or, at least, a part of it, if you could : that is to say, it 

 money would have got it. Yet you had not a single square rod. 

 Mr. HULME, (See Journal, 28th July) says, in the way of reason 

 for your having no crops this year, that you could purchase with 

 more economy than you could grow ! Indeed ! what ; would 

 the Indian Corn have cost, then, more than the price of the Corn ? 

 Untoward observation ; but perfectly true, I am convinced. 

 There is, it is my opinion, nobody that can raise Indian Corn or 

 Grain at so great a distance from a market to any profit at all with 

 hired labour. Nay, this is too plain a case to be matter of opinion. 

 I may safely assume it as an indisputable fact. For, it being 

 notorious, that labour is as high priced with you as with us, and 

 your statement shewing that Corn is not much more than one 

 third of our price, how monstrous, if you gain at all, must be the 

 Consumers gains here ! The rent of the land here is a mere 

 trifle more than it must be there, for the cultivated part must pay 

 rent for the uncultivated part. The labour, indeed, as all the 

 world knows, is every thing. All the other expences are not 

 worth speaking of. What, then, must be the gains of the Long 

 Island farmer, who sells his corn at a dollar a bushel, if you, with 

 labour at the Long Island price, can gain by selling Corn at the 

 rate of five bushels for two dollars ! If yours be a fine country for 

 English farmers to migrate to, what must this be ? You want no 

 manure. This cannot last long ; and, accordingly, I see, that you 

 mean to dung for toheat after the second crop of Corn. This is 

 another of the romantic stories exposed. In Letter IV you relate 

 the romance of manure being useless : but, in Letter X, you tell us, 

 that you propose to use it. Land bearing crops without a manure, 

 or, with new-culture and constant ploughing, is a romance. This 

 I told you in London ; and this you have found to be true. 



1 020. It is of little consequence what wild schemes are formed 

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